Review Games

Using Review games in the classroom:

Review games can be a fun and interactive way for students to review for an assessment. It allows students to be engaged and involved in an active form of studying. There are a few things that need to be remembered before using a game in your classroom, however:

• You must plan it ahead of time. Be sure to include only material you will be testing on. You will want to carefully come up with questions so that they are not confusing and are easy for students to answer, provided they know the answer. You shouldn't use the same questions from your assessment, students will remember the answers from the game.
• Choose a game that best fits the material you will be testing. We have included several templates. Some are better for vocab words, while others will be more universal. Browse through all of them to determine which is best for what you are reviewing. For example: I used jeopardy for my forces unit. It was very effective and the students loved it. I will say it was hard to come up with good answers so that the students can guess the correct question. This probably would have been better for a more vocabulary heavy unit, because you have to make sure that the questions are simple enough to be guessed by your students.
• Make sure you check your equipment before class starts. I made my jeopardy game at home, then when I went to use it in the class, all of the hyperlinks were messed up. So I had to keep the students busy while I quickly fixed it. The students got very impatient. So do yourself a favor, and go through the entire game (If it's on PowerPoint) before classes start, to make sure it all works.If you have to fiddle with it in class, it allows students to get off track and more likely misbehave.
• You should determine the rules of the game ahead of time, and make sure they make sense. You don't want to be fumbling to figure out what to do during class time. Students love games, and will want maximum time to play. The more lag time, the more rambunctious they will become. You want to minimize chaos. The best classroom management is to be overly prepared.
• You want to determine how groups will be structured ahead of time. I am not a fan of allowing students to pick their groups. This leads to them fighting over the 'smart kids' and other students getting picked last. Whatever you think will work best for your class, plan it ahead of time and stick to it.
• You will want to establish a code of conduct that you find appropriate before the game is used. Students tend to get competitive and chaotic during games, and it is important that they clearly know what is expected of them. That way, if they don't comply, they will be out of the game or even out of the room. You don't want to just let behaviors slide, because then the students will take it further and further, thinking it is okay. However, the students should still be able to have fun. So make sure you have a clear vision of where the line is between acceptable and unacceptable, and make sure they know what is unacceptable and their consequences.
• When you are planning a review game keep in mind that you want to have all of the students active in the game. If there is a lot of down time the students that aren't as involved they start to talk and cause distraction to the class which makes the review game harder to control. One way to do this is when one student is answering to have all of the other students ready to correct an answer for extra points.

The following two links also have some great information about using games in the classroom. They also contain some templates. Below you will find a ton of templates and rules for some great games that we have used, or would use in our classroom.

Using games in Science Classrooms

• This link talks about using games in the science classroom. A seasoned teacher talks about what works and doesn't work in her eyes. It also describes and gives templates for various games.

Using Review Games in the class

Below are links to various review games and templates that you can utilize in your classroom:

• This is a version of Jeopardy that I used in Eighth grade science for forces. This was a review for a quiz. First I came up with all of the topics in that I am assessing and that I expect the student to have an understanding of based upon my teaching. Once I have a list, I determined the level that I was expecting the students to understand. I came up with a bunch of answers (or questions that I knew that the students could give as answers to my questions. I broke students into four groups and they were asked to choose a topic and point value.

PowerPoint Templates

• The above link contains PowerPoint templates such as racing games, Jeopardy templates, Wheel of Fortune templates, and various additional templates that are easy to use. I have used these in my classroom and found that they are very easy to edit to make your own.

• Here is an example of a short review game for acceleration and free fall. It is mostly on concepts although there are calculation that are relatively simple; the game is bases on Who Wants to be a Millionaire. This is a review game for a lower level class. You can decide how you want to score the game; two ways I've seen used are added up the points for each question or the winner is the team that answers the most questions correct in a row. A good way to do this is with 4 or 5 small grounds and have each group write they're answers on individual white boards.

• This is a Jeopardy Review game for writing and naming compounds, types of reactions and predicting products. I had the students in several groups, each group had a white board to write down their answers. I gave the students a reasonable amount of time to answer a question then all of the groups showed their white board at the same time and points were given for correct answers. You can take off points for incorrect answers but that can be difficult if you have a group that is struggling because they know they have no way to catch up in final jeopardy and that can become a problem. I also rotated which group picked the next question.

Templates for various Games

Games to use in the science classroom

• The link above contains games that you can download and use in your classroom as a review. The games include The Price is Right, Hollywood Squares, Survivor, The Weakest Link, Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Wheel of Fortune, Deal or No Deal, Are you Smarter than a Fifth Grader, and Family Feud. The games include the show's sound effects and actual graphics. In my experience the students get really excited the more authentic the game. These templates are easy to download, easy to use, and very fun to use in your classroom.

Games for the classroom

• The link above contains a list of many different links which have many other review games. The links contain many different ideas for review games that could be used in the classroom.

• This is a great review game! The students loved it in my classes. The game is based on football; a football field is drawn on the board and there are several difficulties of questions for the different types of plays, run, pass, and punt/field goal. The student get yardage based on which type of play they are running and how quickly they answer the question. Once again let me say that the students loved this game because being based on football made the students very competitive and they all participated even the students that aren't that interested in sports.

• This is an interactive game with funny characters that the kids like. It is in the form of tic-tac-toe, so students must not only answer questions, they must get three in a row it win. (If one group doesn't get it right the other can steal). For this one, I would split the room in half (X's and O's) and possibly have them line up so that everyone answers a question. Meant for a shorter unit.

This is in a fill in the blank style review. Vocab or review words are written into a sentence with the word covered by a curtain. Students must guess the correct word.


Great Template for Who wants to be a millionaire. Looks just like the game show. Meant to scaffold questions from easy to hard. You can even make more than one version so that different groups in your class can play for the 'million' just like the show. I would do something to keep all students interactive and engaged though.


This Template is in the form of 20 questions.

This template is in the form of the weakest link. Modeled after the show.

This template is in the form of The Wheel of Fortune. Isn't exactly modeled after the TV show game. It's for whole class review. PowerPoint has a wheel to "spin". Students contain an index card with one of the numbers on it and a question. If the arrow points on their number, they pick a student to answer their question. This allows everyone a chance to answer questions and be involved.